Sunshine peaking through

Well, it's raining again, but at least I'm not sick.

Or less sick. That bug I got (whatever it was) lasted a full week. I haven't been that ill since 1999; even the H1N1 last January wasn't that bad. I don't think it was a flu, though, because I never got the typical soreness-headache I get from the flu.

Yesterday was the first day I came back to work (this being a hospital, they're a little anal about the whole "infectious diseases" thing), and I was exhausted by the afternoon. Today, not so bad. I still have a little bit of the sniffles, but I'm being careful with tissues and such as well as using hand sanitizer (which I usually abhor, but in this case I'm doing it for others, not myself).

It'll be raining this weekend, but oh well. I'll probably be sleeping.

... When I'm not working, anyway. I think I've mentioned my consulting gig; it's starting to get busy, which means the next few months are going to be pretty hectic for me. Oh well, they're paying me. Or, at least, they should be paying me - she's not quite late with the February payment, but if I don't have something by Saturday I'm going to send an email to check (she will be late by the 1st). I'm a bit axious for this check, because it's the last one that'll hit my statements before I start apartment hunting and, since it'll lower my debt-to-credit ratio, it'll improve my credit rating. Plus, you know, I owe quarterly taxes by the 15th.

Moving. Yeah. I'm starting to "look" online, getting narrower ideas of where I want to look and where I should (not "can", but "should") afford to live - and, luckily, the points that overlap between them. I think I can get a decent place in the $1400 range in a neighborhood I like; I've found a few places with everything I pretty much want for that.

The "downside", of course, is that I'm going to have someone living with me for the first few months. I promised a friend that I'd give him a rent-free place to stay for 6 months so he can try and rebuild his finances. So, I'm not quite going to have the free lifestyle I want, but it might actually be a good thing: this'll provide a bit of a mental buffer between old and new. We'll see how it works out. He's not going on the lease or anything, paying no rent, and bringing in no (or very limited) furniture, so there's no doubt about the fact that it's my place, not his. He's okay with this.

We'll see if we're still okay with it at month 3.

1 comments:

A Wandering Pom said...

Hi there, Austin

I'm sorry about my long silence: I seem to have been busy elsewhere, in blog-land and outside it, and my attention hasn't been focused on any of your posts for long enough to produce a comment. I'm hoping this will change.

I'm glad to hear you're feeling better than you were; I'm afraid it hadn't properly registered with me that you were ill before. It might not have been flu, but it sounds to me like some sort of viral nasty. Don't be too surprised if it takes a while for your stamina to get back to normal.

Best of luck with the consulting, and accommodation-hunting, and sharing with your friend. House-sharing can be quite difficult: you're both likely to find aspects of each other's characters and behaviour that you didn't know before, and may well not much like.

And finally: is there any chance you could send over some of your rain? This may seem an odd request for a Brit to make of a Californian (!), but it's been a surprisingly dry winter over here (if rather dull) and our reservoirs and crops could probably do with a top-up.

Take care

Mark

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